To become a more mindful,
more productive writer, you need to get in touch with your intrapersonal communication—that inner “babble” in which you are constantly talking to yourself. (Don’t worry: we all talk to ourselves.)
That
inner talk is where you can find ideas for writing as well as the energy to
continue writing projects.
Of
course, meditation helps us with this. Meditation is all about noticing how in
our constant self-talk we are sorting our experience (into good, bad, and
indifferent) in the misguided but all-too-human attempt to make life
comfortable for us.
Some of my writing students, however, say they are unable to notice when their minds depart from the present moment. They say they can’t notice their monkey minds. They have no idea what mindfulness feels like.
To help those students, I devised the following exercise. I hope it might be of some use to you. The first 10 steps are the set-up for the exercise.
1.
Go
to a quiet location.
2.
Put
a piece of paper and a pen or pencil beside you.
3.
Sit
gently upright, hands resting either palms-up or palms-down on your knees.
4.
Scan
your body for its feelings: where are you tense?
5.
With
eyes gently focused on a spot a few feet away, begin watching your breathing.
6.
Notice
the sensation of the breath entering and leaving your nose.
7.
Notice
the sensation of the rise and fall of your torso.
8.
Breathing
in, think to yourself, “Here.”
9.
Breathing
out, think to yourself, “Now.”
10. Continue to put your attention on
your breathing.
Whenever you notice that your
mind has wandered from watching your breath, briefly turn to your piece of
paper. Jot down one of the following:
ü FUTURE
(for a distracting thought about the future moment after this meditation
session)
ü PAST
(for a distracting thought about a time before this meditation session)
ü EVALUATION
(for any thought that judges your present circumstance—for instance, whether you
are pleased, irritated, or bored with the Now)
Do
this notation fairly quickly. Don’t make a big deal of it. After you note “future,”
“past” or “evaluation,” return to watching your breathing.
The next time you find that you’re no longer watching your breathing, return to the piece of paper and again record one of those three words.
After
5-10 minutes, if you’re like the rest of us, your sheet is probably one long
list of distractions.
Did
you notice, however, a difference in experience? Did the moments in which you
were blindly daydreaming suddenly stand apart from another set—ones in which
you were more aware?
If
so, you may be well on your way to tasting mindfulness. Maybe more importantly,
what you succeeded in doing is shaking hands with your own inner conversation.
Next time, watch that conversation and ask it a question about your writing. A good start might be, “What would I like to write down, right now, in this moment?” Or, “What do you have to say to me about Idea X?”